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English Literature and Composition

IntroductionAn AP English Literature and Composition course engages students in the careful reading and critical analysis of literature. Through the close reading of selected texts, students deepen their understanding of the ways writers use language to provide both meaning and pleasure for their readers. As they read, students consider a work’s structure, style and themes as well as such smaller-scale elements as the use of figurative language, symbolism and tone.

Course Overview In addition to complying with the curricular requirements described in the AP

English Course Description, (C1) this course must comply with out state English IV Standard Course of Study, which focuses on British Literature. The AP Literature and Composition requirements for American Literature are met in the AP Language and Composition course, which must also comply with our state English III American Literature requirements.

The exact sequence outlined in this syllabus will not be the same each year. The thematic organization, however, is broad enough to allow for substitutions and additions. Students are never without a reading assignment or outside writing assignment.

This course is a daily ninety-minute course that meets for an entire school year. The school year is divided into nine-week quarters.

Unit 1: Conformity and RebellionFocus

Summer Reading Assessment Grammar/Proofreading Practice Figurative Language and Literary Analysis Rhetorical Devices Literary Criticism: Feminist, Marxist, Historicist, Postcolonial, Archetypal Characterization, point of view, author’s purpose, style, tone, mood; gothic

elements, historical perspective, symbolism, imagery, romanticism vs. realism; figurative language; historical perspective; stylistic techniques; diction and style; narrative techniques; author’s purpose; bias; stereotype; denotation and connotation; diction and tone;

Becoming Familiar with the AP test and format Notetaking and Annotating: Cornell Model Genres: novel, essay, poetry, memoir, editorial, short story, satire

Major Works (C2) Hard Times (fiction/summer reading) (2 weeks) Pride and Prejudice (fiction/summer reading) (2 weeks) Jane Eyre (fiction) (2 weeks) Wide Sargasso Sea (fiction) (1 week)

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Sula (fiction) Woman Warrior (non-fiction)

Selections (may included but not limited to) (C2) from “A Vindication of the Rights of Women” (Mary Wollstencraft) “Much Madness is Divinist Sense” (Emily Dickinson) “She Rose to his Requirement Dropped” (Emily Dickinson) “Universe” (Mary Swenson) “Easter 1916” (William Butler Yeats) “The Second Coming” (William Butler Yeats) “The Great Day” (William Butler Yeats) “Ulysses” (Alfred, Lord Tennyson) “Revolutionary Dreams” (Nikki Giovanni) “A Modest Proposal” (Jonathon Swift) an excerpt from Lady Windermere’s Fan (Oscar Wilde)

Activities Become Familiar with the AP test and format by reviewing sample multiple-

choice exams, taking multiple choice tests using the AP English Literature & Composition Examination workbooks, writing multiple-choice questions, and analyzing writing prompts and sample essays.

Style: Using Children’s Books to understand elements of style (tone, diction, syntax, figurative language, devices of language, imagery, point of view, organization, musicality, rhyme, meter, use of time, repetition, selection of detail) (C3 & C4)

Test on all assigned summer reading AP Pretest (multiple choice), intended to identify student ability so that teacher

can focus teaching Grammar/Proofreading Practice using Daily Grammar Practice.

o There will be daily mini-lessons throughout the course dealing with complex grammar and usage issues, sentence constructions, and diction. (C5)

Major Works Data Sheets: (C3)o Students will complete one of these for each of the major works that they

read. Sometimes they will work with partners and other times will complete them on their own.

Historical Information Plot summary Characterization: direct, indirect, type, character traits,

significance, and page numbers to support Characteristics of the genre Symbols Thematic statements/Topics of discussion: (must have page

numbers) Significance of opening scene Significance of ending/closing scene Setting

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Author’s style: examples that demonstrate styleWriting

All assignments for formal papers will include a specific grading rubric. We will go over the rubrics prior to submitting papers and review for the particular composition or paper.

o Chapters from Edgar V. Roberts Writing About Literature will supplement composition instruction. Students will be expected to rewrite larger papers and analysis after receiving feedback from the teacher. (C5)

o Timed writings (essay tests) will present a scoring guide as feedback. These will be scoring guides as used by the AP English Literature and Composition Exam for the specific questions. Essay Tests will need to be typed directly into the text blank online. (C4)

In-Class timed essay on summer reading assignment, Pride and Prejudice that is based on an open-essay question from a previous AP Exam (1994): (C4)In some works of literature, a character who appears briefly, who does not appear at all, or who seems to play a minor role is a significant presence. Using Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, write an essay in which you show how such a characters functions in the novel. You may wish to discuss how the character affects action, theme, or the development of other characters. Avoid plot summary

o Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how character affects action, theme, or the development of other characters. (C5)

o Upon completion of the essays, students will workshop with each other, using a previously discussed rubric, and will have the opportunity to revise essays. (C4)

o Teacher will encourage students to vary sentence length and structure and will point out particularly well-constructed phrases and apt word choices, subtle and appropriate transition statements, and original illustrative details. (C5)

Students will write a college admissions essay in which they apply the principals of essay writing. Students will write and rewrite the essay and then submit it to prospective colleges. (C4)

o Students will explore ideas about themselves to determine their topics of writing

o Students will understand and work with personal writing including but not limited to anecdote, dialogue, details, language, syntax, and varied structures (C5)

o Direct composition instruction on introduction/openings, voice, use of first-person pronouns, apostrophe, and conventions. (C5)

Students will work with conventions of Standard Written English Students will participate in peer editing, rewriting, revising (C5)

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(1) essay per week, some of which will include AP Passage Responses (much writing and revision to be done in class, but at-home writing will also be required.) (C4 &C5)

Wide Sargasso Sea: select one motif from the novel, examine its various appearances in the book, quote liberally, and explore what insights into the novel, the characters, the themes, and life. Examples of possible motifs are drinking, gender, body color, sex, sanity vs. insanity, music, fire, colors. (C3)

Papers will be written regularly in class to spur thinking, stimulate discussion, and focus on issues of plot, characterization, theme, and purpose. (C3) Papers will often be written following Socratic seminars but may also be written prior to the seminars to stimulate discussion in Socratic Seminars.

Poetry Analysis: Each student will write several short critical papers explicating poetry based on its textual details and outside critical essays (research based). These critical essays are based on close textual analysis of structure, style (figurative language, imagery, symbolism, tone, point of view, diction, syntax, meter, repetition, devices of language)and social/historical values (C3)

Poetry Activity o Students will annotate poems (voice, figurative language, mood, tone,

theme, style, structure) from previously released AP exams (C3)o Students will exchange poems with a partner and the partner will add

any annotations that he/she finds. o Students will discuss their annotations with their partnerso Students will write thesis statements for the poems, based on the

prompt. Students will then discuss statements with partner.o Students will outline their essays for their poems.o Timed Writing

Students will write for fifteen minutes and will then exchange papers with partners. Students will have ten minutes to discuss papers and offer feedback.

Students will then continue writing their individual essays. Students will be given twenty-five additional minutes to finish

writing essay. Students will then exchange essays again

Students will highlight thesis statements Students will highlight the “proof” that supports the

thesis statements Students will return essays to “owners.”

o Direct Composition instruction: format-clear thesis, incorporation of lines and quotes, pronoun usage, support paragraphs, introduction necessary for audience, thesis followed throughout, strong concluding paragraph.

Students will then revise for essays and type to be returned to teacher (C4)

Teacher will then give detailed feedback to students: effective word choice, inventive sentence structure,

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effective overall organization, clear emphasis and a overall, excellence of argument, including exhaustive support evidence (i.e. quotations) and clear, persuasive, elegant connection of this evidence to overall arguments. (C5)

Dialectical Journals: Students will keep dialectical journals on all Major Works selections (C3). Students will write to discover (C4) and will also focus on the following: structure, style, theme; social and historical values the text reflects and embodies; and the use of figurative language, imagery, symbolism, and tone. (C3)

Timed writing on irony and satire (C4) Review the definition of satire, in addition to caricature, parody,

hyperbole, irony litotes and burlesque; examples are given of each. Students then read Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” and view a clip from Jon Stewart’s “Daily Show,” analyzing the rhetorical strategies, elements of satire, and ultimate purpose of each. Finally, students find an example of satire to share and discuss with the group. (C4)

Students will then write an essay in which they explore the rhetorical strategies used by Swift and their effects.(They will apply information acquired through part one of this activity.

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding. (C5)

Upon completion of the essays, students will workshop with each other, using a previously discussed rubric, and will have the opportunity to revise essays. (C4)

Teacher will encourage students to vary sentence length and structure and will point out particularly well-constructed phrases and apt word choices, subtle and appropriate transition statements, and original illustrative details. (C5)

Timed Writing: AP Prompt (1999) The eighteenth-century British novelist

Laurence Sterne wrote, “No body, but he who has felt it, can conceive what a plaguing thing it is to have a man’s mind torn asunder by two projects of equal strength, both obstinately pulling in a contrary direction at the same time.” Choose a character, not necessarily the protagonist) whose mind is pulled in conflicting directions by two compelling desires, ambitions, obligations, or influences. Then, in a well-organized essay, identify each of the two conflicting forces and explain how this conflict with one character illuminates the meaning of the work as a whole. (C4) Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows

the teacher to comment on student understanding of the two conflicting forces and how this conflict illuminates the meaning of the work as a whole. (C5)


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Timed Writing: AP Prompt (2001) One definition of madness is “mental delusion or the eccentric behavior arising from it.” But Emily Dickinson wrote

Much madness is divinist Sense-To a discerning Eye-

Novelists and playwrights have often seen madness with a “discerning Eye.” Select a novel or play in which a character’s apparent madness or irrational behavior plays an important role. Then in a well-organized essay explain what this delusion or eccentric behavior consists of and how it might be judged reasonable. Explain the significance of the “madness” to the work as a whole. Do not merely summarize the plot. (C4)

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of the significance of the “madness” to the work as a whole. (C5)



Timed Writing: AP Prompt (2006) Using the excerpt from Oscar Wilde’s Lady Windermere’s Fan, write a well-organized essay in which you analyze how the playwright reveals the values of the characters and the nature of their society (C4)

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how the playwright reveals the values of the characters and the nature of their society. (C5)



Unit 2: The Individual and SocietyFocus

Grammar/Proofreading Practice Writing Literary analysis: characterization; conflict; symbolism;

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Literary Criticism: African American Criticism, Feminist Criticism, Reader Response, Historicist,

allegory; allusion; musical devices and poetry,characterization, point of view, author’s purpose, style, tone, mood; historical perspective, symbolism, imagery; figurative language; stylistic techniques; diction and style; narrative techniques; author’s purpose; bias; stereotype; denotation and connotation; diction and tone;

Genres: novel, drama, short story, poetry, essay, science fiction

Major Works (C2) Heart of Darkness (fiction) (1 week) Invisible Man (fiction) (2 weeks) Othello (Drama) (4 weeks) Othello (Non Text) Apocalypse Now (non-text) (1 week) 1984 (fiction) Frankenstein (fiction) (2 weeks)

Selections (may include but not limited to) (C2) “The Chimney Sweeper” (1789) (William Blake) “The Chimney Sweeper (1794) (William Blake) “My Papa’s Waltz” (Roethke) “Dover Beach” (Matthew Arnold) “Ode on a Grecian Urn” (John Keats) “Marriage is a Private Affair” (Chinua Achebe) “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (T.S. Eliot) "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness" (Chinua Achebe) “The Hollow Men” (T.S. Eliot) “The Guest” (Albert Camus) “I Stand Here Ironing” (Tillie Olsen) “What Makes You Who You Are” (Matt Ridley) “How the Nature vs. Nurture Debate Shapes Public Policy—and Our View of

Ourselves” (Wray Herbert) “Heart of Darkness” (Mark Dintenfass) “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)



Grammar/Proofreading Practice using Daily Grammar Practice.o There will be daily mini-lessons throughout the course dealing with

complex grammar and usage issues, sentence constructions, and diction. (C5)

Major Works Data Sheets: (C3)

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o Students will complete one of these for each of the major works that they read. Sometimes they will work with partners and other times will complete them on their own.



numbers) Significance of opening scene Significance of ending/closing scene Setting Author’s style: examples that demonstrate style

Writing All assignments for formal papers will include a specific grading rubric. We will

go over the rubrics prior to submitting papers and review for the particular composition or paper.


o Timed writings (essay tests) will present a scoring guide as feedback. These will be scoring guides as used by the AP English Literature and Composition Exam for the specific questions. Essay Tests will often be typed directly into the text blank online.

Students will write a comparison essay in which the compare Apocalypse Now and Heart of Darkness: Students will draw upon textual details to make and explain judgments about both work’s artistry and quality, and its social and cultural value. (C4)

Students will analyze critical analysis about each of their major works and will write a response to the analysis in which they identify theme, paraphrase theme, identify the author’s supporting details, and then identify what insights they gain into the major texts as a result of reading and analyzing this critical essay. (C4)

Timed writing : AP Prompt 2003: According to critic Northrop Frye, “Tragic heroes are so much the highest points in their human landscape that they seem the inevitable conductors of the power about them, great trees more likely to be struck by lightening than a clump of grass. Conductors may of course be instruments as well as victims of the divine lightning.” Select a novel of play in which a tragic figure functions as an instrument of the suffering of others. Then write an essay in which you explain how the suffering brought upon others by that figure contributes to the tragic vision of the work as a whole. Avoid plot summary. Students will be given a rubric prior to writing and to assess their own writing (C4)

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Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how suffering brought upon by others by the tragic figure contributes to the tragic vision of the work as a whole. (C5)



Timed Writing. AP Prompt 2002: Morally ambiguous characters-characters whose behavior discourages readers from identifying them as purely evil or purely good-are at the heart of many works of literature. Choose a novel or play in which a morally ambiguous character plays a pivotal role. Then write an essay in which you explain how the character can be viewed as morally ambiguous and why his or her moral ambiguity is significant to the work as a whole. Avoid mere plot summary. Students will be given a rubric prior to writing and as a tool to assess their own writing. (C4)

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how a morally ambiguous character can play a pivotal role in a novel and how this moral ambiguity is significant to the work as a whole. (C5)



Timed Writing AP Prompt (2006) In many works of literature, a physical journey-the literal movement from one place to another-plays a central role. Choose a novel, play, or epic poem in which a physical journey is an important element and discuss how the journey adds to the meaning of the work as a whole. Avoid mere plot summary. (C4).

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how a physical journey is an important element of a novel, play or epic poem and how this journey adds meaning to the work as a whole.. (C5)


Teacher will encourage students to vary sentence length and structure and will point out particularly well-constructed phrases and apt word choices, subtle and appropriate transition statements, and original illustrative details. (C5

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Timed writing on short fiction including samples and scoring guide (C4) Timed Writing (AP Prompt 2005) “The Chimney Sweeper” (1789) and “The

Chimney Sweeper” (1794): The two poems above, published in 1789 and 1794, were written by William Blake in response to the condition of chimney sweeps. Usually small children, sweeps were forced inside chimneys to clean their interiors. Read the two poems carefully. Then in a well-written essay, compare and contrast the two poems, taking into consideration the poetic techniques Blake uses in each.(C3 & C4)

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding the two poems and how these poems are both similar and different, taking into consideration the poetic techniques used by Blake. (C5)



Poetry Activity o Students will annotate poems (voice, figurative language, mood, tone,

theme, style, structure) from previously released AP exams (C3)o Students will exchange poems with a partner and the partner will add

any annotations that he/she finds. o Students will discuss their annotations with their partnerso Students will write thesis statements for the poems, based on the








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Teacher will then give detailed feedback to students: effective word choice, inventive sentence structure, effective overall organization, clear emphasis and a overall, excellence of argument, including exhaustive support evidence (i.e. quotations) and clear, persuasive, elegant connection of this evidence to overall arguments. (C5)




Unit 3: Innocence and ExperienceFocus

Grammar/Proofreading Practice Figurative Language and Literary Analysis Rhetorical Devices Literary Criticism: Feminist, Marxist, Historicist, Reader-Response, Archetypal allegory; allusion; musical devices and poetry, characterization, point of view,

author’s purpose, style, tone, mood; historical perspective, symbolism, imagery; figurative language; stylistic techniques; diction and style; narrative techniques; author’s purpose; bias; stereotype; denotation and connotation; diction and tone;

Genres: novel, drama, poetry, short story,

Major Works (C2) Ethan Frome (fiction) (1 week) Tess of the D’Urbervilles (2 weeks) Much Ado About Nothing (Drama) (2 weeks)

Selections (may include but not limited to) (C2) “The Tyger” (William Blake) “The Lamb” (William Blake) “Constantly Risking Absurdity” (Lawrence Ferlinghetti)

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“The Sun Rising” (John Donne) “Death be not Proud (John Donne) “Meeting at Night” (Elizabeth Barrett Browning) “Parting at Morning” (Elizabeth Barret Browning) “Winter” (William Shakespeare) “The Rocking Horse Winner” (D.H. Lawrence) “The Broken Heart” (John Donne) “Nurse’s Song” (Innocence) (William Blake) “Nurse’s Song” (Experience) (William Blake) “Astronomer’s Wife” (Kay Boyle) “The Kiss” (Julia Alvarez) “A Dream of Death” (William Butler Yeats)



Grammar/Proofreading Practice using Daily Grammar Practice.o There will be daily mini-lessons throughout the course dealing with

complex grammar and usage issues, sentence constructions, and diction. (C5)

Major Works Data Sheets: (C3)o Students will complete one of these for each of the major works that they

read. Sometimes they will work with partners and other times will complete them on their own.



numbers) Significance of opening scene Significance of ending/closing scene Setting Author’s style: examples that demonstrate style

Writing All assignments for formal papers will include a specific grading rubric. We will

go over the rubrics prior to submitting papers and review for the particular composition or paper.


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o Timed writings (essay tests) will present a scoring guide as feedback. These will be scoring guides as used by the AP English Literature and Composition Exam for the specific questions. Essay Tests will need to be typed directly into the text blank online. (C4)

Students will analyze critical analysis about each of their major works and will write a response to the analysis in which they identify theme, paraphrase theme, identify the author’s supporting details, and then identify what insights they gain into the major texts as a result of reading and analyzing this critical essay.

Literary Analysis Essay (expository)-Shakespeare’s “Winter” including teacher model and rubric. Essay will be shared in class and emphasis includes sonnet form, paraphrase, imagery, syntax, and poetic language. (C4)

Timed Writing-literary analysis comparing and contrasting two Renaissance sonnets, including samples and scoring guide. (C4)

Timed Writing: AP Prompt (1995): Students will be asked to write a well-organized essay in which they analyze how the speaker of “The Broken Heart” by John Donne uses the varied imagery of the poem to reveal his attitude toward the nature of love. (C4)

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how Donne uses varied imagery to reveal his attitude toward the nature of love in “The Broken Heart”. (C5)



Timed Writing AP Prompt (1988) Choose a distinguished novel or play in which some of the most significant events are mental or psychological; for example, awakenings, discoveries, and changes in consciousness. In a well-organized essay, describe how the author manages to give these internal events the sense of excitement, suspense, and climax usually associated with external action. Do not merely summarize the plot (C4).

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how the author uses internal actions, awakenings, discoveries, or changes in consciousness, to create the sense of excitement, suspense, and climax usually associated with external action. (C5)



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Timed Writing AP Prompt (1992) In a novel or play, a confidant (male) or confidante (female) is a character, often a friend or relative of the hero or heroine, whose role is to be present when the hero or heroine needs a sympathetic listener to confide in. Frequently the result is, as Henry James remarked, that the confidant or confidante can be as much “the reader’s friend as the protagonist’s.” However, the author sometimes uses this character for other purposes as well. Choose a confidant or confidante from a novel or play of recognized literary merit and write an essay in which you discuss the various ways this character functions in the work. (C4).

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how character affects action, theme, or the development of other characters. (C5)



Timed Writing AP Prompt (1991) Many plays and novels use contrasting places (for example, two countries, two cities or towns, two houses, or the land and the sea) to represent opposed forces or ideas that are central to the meaning of the work. Choose a novel or play that contrasts two such places. Write an essay explaining how the places differ, what each place represents, and how their contrast contributes to the meaning of the work. (C4).

Students will write thesis statements at the top of their essays, which allows the teacher to comment on student understanding of how novels or plays use contrasting places and what each place represents, and how their contrast contributes the meaning of the work as a whole. (C5)





Poetry Activity

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o Students will annotate poems (voice, figurative language, mood, tone, theme, style, structure) from previously released AP exams (C3)

o Students will exchange poems with a partner and the partner will add any annotations that he/she finds.

o Students will discuss their annotations with their partnerso Students will write thesis statements for the poems, based on the









Teacher will then give detailed feedback to students: effective word choice, inventive sentence structure, effective overall organization, clear emphasis and a overall, excellence of argument, including exhaustive support evidence (i.e. quotations) and clear, persuasive, elegant connection of this evidence to overall arguments. (C5)


Primary Resources (C1 & C2) Burnette, Dawn. Daily Grammar Practice: College Level. Peachtree City: DGP

Publishing, 2003. Cuddon, J.A. The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. 4th

Edition. London: Penguin, 1998.

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Kennedy, X.J. and Dana Gioia. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry and Drama. 8th Edition. New York: Longman, 2002.

Roberts, Edgar V. Writing About Literature. 10th Edition. Vogel, Dr. Richard. Multiple-Choice and Free-Response Questions in

Preparation for the AP English Literature and Composition Examination. 7th Edition. Brooklyn: D&S Marketing Systems, 2006.

Secondary Resources Appleman, Deborah. Critical Encounters in High School English: Teaching

Literary Theory to Adolescents. New York: Teachers College Press, 2000. Barton, Edwin J. and Glenda A. Hudson. A Contemporary Guide to Literary

Terms. Boston: Mifflin, 2004. Dean, Nancy. Voice Lessons. Gainesville: Maupin House Book Publishing,

2004. Felder, Deborah G. A Bookshelf of Our Own: Works that Changed Women’s

Lives. New York: Kensington Publishing, 2005. Rankin, Estelle and Barbara L. Murphy. 5 Steps to a 5: AP English Literature.

McGraw-Hill: New York, 2002. Schwiebert, John E. Reading and Writing from Literature. 3rd Edition. Boston:

Houghton Mifflin, 2005.

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